Gods Of the Monsoon, Barrie Scott [i am malala young readers edition .TXT] 📗

was with no small relief that the original band of helpers had greeted the return of the flamboyant new smile that had earlier all but driven them away.
His open-air chapel was for the first time packed with people. Clearly it was all working. Things were finally changing. He looked on, his conviction, born of the years studying devotedly for the cloth, profoundly refreshed. Soon the majestic chords of divine inspiration, the sounds of the wrath of the creator would thunder forth .It was a very minor sibling of the great cathedral organs that send awe coursing through high vaulted stones, but as he had learned at missionary school this miraculous piece of equipment would bring them to the fold.
Hammers and levers appeared quickly to unwrap this treasure and the people of the village surged forwards to set eyes on the face of this foreign god and have the mysteries unravelled.
As one they cried out in wonder at the creation emerging from the crate, the scarlet and deep green, the embossed polished brass plate announcing that this wonderful cast iron structure was made in Leeds by eminent boilermakers. It was pristine with the finishing marks of the engineering process still visible, the like of which none among them had been close to let alone touched.
Edgar surged forward, shouldering aside the local priest who had earlier quietly come to his aid who was now closely scrutinising this piece of workmanship. Edgar grabbed up a sheaf of papers: invoices, waybills and certificates. It was the boiler for a narrow gauge steam engine: the wrong consignment, the wrong port. Either.
The locals, were a people for whom, if you could not make it with hand-tools you would not have it. Simple. They had no conception of an iron foundry, vast vats of white-hot molten steel and were too engrossed by this miracle to notice Edgar Wilkins, teeth clenched, really losing it this time, spitting, swearing loudly, and stamping on the documents. For them it was clearly worth all efforts, it was the bulk of the thing, the wonderful pristine colours solidly stove enamelled, the great curves. Children were lifted to run their fingers through the embossed lettering.
Across the deserts and mountain forests of the subcontinent to this day are regions where small groups of Christians indeed took up the gospel. The Indian railway network however is said to be the biggest employer in the world. Even in distant villages where they still light their fires of dried buffalo dung they have each day, as a distant soundtrack, the horns of big engines slicing through the hot air.

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Publication Date: 07-27-2010

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